Top companies and drugs by sales in 2021
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Therapeutic antibodies account for four of the ten top therapeutics by sales in 2021.
“Therapeutic antibodies are highly successful biotherapeutics and account for four of the ten top therapeutics by sales in 2021 [1].”
From Computational and artificial intelligence-based methods for antibody development (2023) · cites this paper as [1]
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Computational and artificial intelligence-based methods for antibody development
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Targeted modulation of immune cells and tissues using engineered biomaterials
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The Dawn of a New Era: Targeting the “Undruggables” with Antibody-Based Therapeutics
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Want to prevent pandemics? Stop spillovers
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Biomaterials-Mediated Engineering of the Immune System
Backlund, C. M., Jalili‐Firoozinezhad, S., Kim, B., & Irvine, D. J. (2023) · Annual Review of Immunology · doi:10.1146/annurev-immunol-101721-040259 · Cited by 48 · see citing works
Shin, Y. E., Kumar, A., & Guo, J. J. (2023) · Clinical Drug Investigation · doi:10.1007/s40261-023-01254-x · Cited by 43 · see citing works
Estrada-Almeida, A. G., Castrejón-Godínez, M. L., Mussali-Galante, P., Tovar‐Sánchez, E., & Rodríguez, A. (2024) · Journal of Xenobiotics · doi:10.3390/jox14040082 · Cited by 37 · see citing works
Molecular Farming of Pembrolizumab and Nivolumab
Stark, M., Joubert, A. M., & Visagie, M. H. (2023) · International Journal of Molecular Sciences · doi:10.3390/ijms241210045 · Cited by 35 · see citing works
Jyssum, I., Gehin, J. E., Sexton, J., et al. (2023) · Lara D. Veeken · doi:10.1093/rheumatology/kead525 · Cited by 33 · see citing works
“Adalimumab, a fully human monoclonal antibody, is the most commonly used TNFi worldwide in the treatment of several immune-mediated inflammatory diseases, including inflammatory joint diseases [11, 12].”
BackgroundHeithoff, D. M., Barnes, L., V, Mahan, S. P., et al. (2023) · Cell Reports Medicine · doi:10.1016/j.xcrm.2023.101023 · Cited by 32 · see citing works
“Additional factors include reduced incentives for pharmaceutical research and development for diseases that require relatively short courses of treatment (infectious diseases) relative to blockbuster drugs for pervasive diseases (cancer, cardiovascular diseases, hyperlipidemia, and immune disorders).(6,7) The healthca…”
BackgroundXu, H., Mao, B., Ni, S., Xie, X., Tang, S., Wang, Y., Zan, X., Zheng, Q., & Huang, W. (2024) · ACS Nano · doi:10.1021/acsnano.3c12203 · Cited by 30 · see citing works
Functionalization of polymers for intracellular protein delivery
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Untethered shape-changing devices in the gastrointestinal tract
Liu, W., Choi, S. J., George, D., Li, L., Zhong, Z., Zhang, R., Choi, S. Y., Selaru, F. M., & Gracias, D. H. (2023) · Expert Opinion on Drug Delivery · doi:10.1080/17425247.2023.2291450 · Cited by 19 · see citing works
“In the last few decades, biological drugs or biologics, including peptides, proteins, antibodies, and nucleic acids, have shown remarkable therapeutic effects for cancer, autoimmune, and chronic diseases, such as diabetes, Crohn’s disease, rheumatoid arthritis, and psoriasis [124,125].”
BackgroundGackowski, M., Madriwala, B., & Koba, M. (2023) · Chemical Papers · doi:10.1007/s11696-023-02994-y · Cited by 17 · see citing works
“8 billion, which also exhibited an increase compared to 2020 (Urquhart 2022).”
BackgroundNovel Isosteviol-Based FXa Inhibitors: Molecular Modeling, In Silico Design and Docking Simulation
Gackowski, M., Madriwala, B., Studzińska, R., et al. (2023) · Molecules · doi:10.3390/molecules28134977 · Cited by 16 · see citing works
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Stratigakis, A., Paty, D., Zou, P., et al. (2023) · Reproduction and Breeding · doi:10.1016/j.repbre.2023.10.003 · Cited by 12 · see citing works
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Antibody-based therapy: An alternative for antimicrobial treatment in the post-antibiotic era
Luo, L., Li, Q., Chen, X., Li, C., Pan, Y., Sun, H., Yu, X., Wen, K., Shen, J., & Wang, Z. (2024) · Microbiological Research · doi:10.1016/j.micres.2024.127974 · Cited by 13 · see citing works
Taharabaru, T., Kihara, T., Onodera, R., et al. (2023) · Materials Today Bio · doi:10.1016/j.mtbio.2023.100690 · Cited by 11 · see citing works
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Chen, S., Le, Z., Gu, J., Liu, L., Liu, Z., & Chen, Y. (2023) · ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces · doi:10.1021/acsami.3c02198 · Cited by 9 · see citing works
Martinelli, E., Spiller, M., Weck, R., Llompart, P., Minoletti, C., Güssregen, S., Sib, A., & Derdau, V. (2024) · Chemistry - A European Journal · doi:10.1002/chem.202402038 · Cited by 8 · see citing works
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Lu, Y., Fukae, Y., Hu, W., & Zhang, Q. (2025) · Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research · doi:10.1021/acs.iecr.4c03986 · Cited by 8 · see citing works
“In 2021, seven of the ten best-selling drugs were biologics, and the entire market size is expected to grow to about $857 billion by 2030 [1].”
Mete, C., & Pınar, P. T. (2023) · ChemistrySelect · doi:10.1002/slct.202204492 · Cited by 8 · see citing works
Accelerating Antibody Design with Active LearningPreprint
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“Four therapeutic antibodies are included in the top-10 bestselling drugs in 2021 [1], and the number of FDA-approved therapeutic antibodies is more than a hundred at present[2]. mAb has two chains (heavy and light) and two regions (variable and constant) for each chain.”
BackgroundSalih, M., Ibrahim, T. G., Ramadan, R. S., Alarifi, N., & Abdulkhair, B. Y. (2025) · Processes · doi:10.3390/pr13103095 · Cited by 7 · see citing works
Modular design of bi- and multi-specific knob domain fusions
Kuravsky, M. L., Gibbons, G. F., Joyce, C., Scott-Tucker, A., Macpherson, A., & Lawson, A. D. G. (2024) · Frontiers in Immunology · doi:10.3389/fimmu.2024.1384467 · Cited by 7 · see citing works
“Over the past decade, monoclonal antibodies (mAbs) have experienced explosive growth as therapeutics (1, 2) and have become one of the best-selling modalities of drugs in the market (3).”
BackgroundMaking the most effective use of available computational methods for drug repositioning
Gori, D. N. P., Alberca, L. N., & Talevi, A. (2023) · Expert Opinion on Drug Discovery · doi:10.1080/17460441.2023.2198700 · Cited by 7 · see citing works
“Collectively, these approved indications have made Humira® (the brand name of adalimumab), the drug product with the largest worldwide sales in 2019 and 2020, and the second drug product with the largest sales in 2021 (only second to a COVID-19 vaccine) [13–15].”
BackgroundShen, Y., Shah, S. R., Zhao, K., & Han, B. (2023) · Extreme Mechanics Letters · doi:10.1016/j.eml.2023.102025 · Cited by 6 · see citing works
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“For example, a recent report indicated that mAbs represented 5 of the top 10 bestselling drugs in 2021 (Urquhart, 2022).”
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Design of Drug Sales Forecasting Model Using Particle Swarm Optimization Neural Networks Model
Yu, C. (2022) · Computational Intelligence and Neuroscience · doi:10.1155/2022/6836524 · Cited by 3 · see citing works
“Urquhart proposed an improved extreme learningmachine algorithm combining batch processing and successive iterations and applied it in medium and long-term forecasting [17].”
MethodA comparative analysis of biologics market dynamics in 12 countries: (Bio)similar and sustainability
Song, Y., Shin, G., Choi, G., et al. (2025) · Frontiers in Pharmacology · doi:10.3389/fphar.2025.1659395 · Cited by 2 · see citing works
“In 2021, biologics accounted for four of the ten highest-selling drugs, including adalimumab, nivolumab, pembrolizumab, and Ustekinumab (Urquhart, 2022).”
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Doctors’ Drugs and the Dangers of Dental Decay
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Quality of biopharmaceuticals: Comparability exercise and post-approval surveillance
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“…antibodies, increased vastly over the last decade, and is also forecasted to increase further in the future (Walsh and Walsh 2022; Farid et al. 2020; Lu et al. 2020), although mRNA technologies (Urquhart 2022) as well as bispecific antibodies (Ma et al. 2021; Lu et al. 2020) are gaining momentum.”
Ko, K. S., Choi, H. N., Yoo, J. Y., & Lee, K. O. (2025) · Plant Biotechnology Reports · doi:10.1007/s11816-025-00993-x · Cited by 1 · see citing works
“…therapeutic agents—including vaccines, hormones, antibodies, chimeric proteins, receptor proteins, and fusion proteins—that are primarily composed of complex biomolecules such as proteins, sugars, nucleic acids, lipids, or their combinations (Urquhart 2022; Walsh and Walsh 2022; Wang et al. 2022).”
Computational Drug Repurposing
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“Although isotope labeling is common for small active pharmaceutical ingredients, studies on isotopically labeled biologics are not as advanced 7,8 , despite these larger biologics becoming increasingly prevalent in the pharmaceutical industry as life changing treatment for patients 9 .”
Artificial intelligence advancements in monoclonal antibody development technology
Ammar, M., Samsonov, M. Y., Gurylina, E., & Bayzigitov, D. R. (2026) · Frontiers in Immunology · doi:10.3389/fimmu.2026.1802038 · Cited by 1 · see citing works
Antibody Productivity of CHO Cells is Altered by ER Stress Tolerance of the Host Cell
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Efficient Sensitivity Analysis in Biomanufacturing with Sequential Shapley Value Estimation
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Deep Mining of Complex Antibody Phage Pools
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“Despite the conflicting reports on the efficacy of remdesivir in COVID-19 patients, the drug is still widely administered as a COVID-19 treatment with approximately $5.6 billion in sales reported by Gilead in 2021 and approximately $1.5 billion reported in the Q1 sales report [11].”
InfluentialTalevi, A. (2026) · Expert Opinion on Drug Discovery · doi:10.1080/17460441.2026.2737326
- Authors
- Urquhart, L.
- Affiliations
- Vantage Power (United Kingdom) (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Urquhart, Lisa
- Venue
- Nature Reviews Drug Discovery
- Published
- 2022-03-11
- Volume
- 21
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 251-251
- ISSN
- 1474-1776 (ISSN-L)
- 1474-1784
- OpenAlex
- W4220880061
- Cited by
- 64
- References
- 0
- Citations by year
- 2026: 5 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 15 · 2023: 32 · 2022: 6
- FWCI
- 11.87
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Nature Reviews Drug Discovery (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Pharmaceutical Economics and Policy
- Life Sciences › Pharmacology, Toxicology and Pharmaceutics › Pharmacology › Pharmaceutical industry and healthcare
- Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Health Systems, Economic Evaluations, Quality of Life
- Keywords
- drug sales, top-selling drugs, pharmaceutical companies, drug market, sales ranking
- MeSH terms
- Commerce, Drug Industry, Humans
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